Saturday, December 01, 2007

Political Connections save Householders

by Ken Houghton

In the midst of claims that Northeast real estate is going to drop 15-40%, some transactions are off-market:
As for Hazleton,[Pennsylvania,] the Giulianis are buying more than gas there these days. On Nov. 1, records show, the couple purchased Nathan's childhood home from her parents for an unspecified sum.

There is, of course, no reason to believe there would be anything suspect about such a transaction. Contrast, for instance, this statement:
"Nobody was trying to hide anything."

with the reality:
One document dated June 26, 2000, shows how money from five such offices - the Mayor's Office of People with Disabilities, the Community Assistance Unit, the Assigned Counsel Administrative Office, the Loft Board and the mayor's liaison to the United Nations - was used to prepay an American Express account to the tune of $60,000...

Carbonetti said that the document - dated four days before the end of the city fiscal year - simply showed how unused money from agencies was being used to prepay bills. [emphases mine]

And the follow-up statement to it:
"It's fiscally responsible to anticipate predictable expenses and prepay them," he argued.

It's also fraud.

Then again, it's the lovable and much-loved-by-the-Beltway Rudolph, so it must not be important.

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